Similarly, Fernando Vargas vs. Javier Castillejo wore a bit long for a crowd that caught only a glimpse of the newfound power Vargas and his camp promised before Saturday's main event at Allstate Arena. Ditto for Ricardo Mayorga's undisciplined pursuit of defensive-minded Michele Piccirillo on the Rahman-Barrett undercard, ending in the wild-swinging Mayorga winning by decision rather than his promised quick knockout.

What else did we learn?

Chicago's crowds of the last two weeks may not know boxing like those in Las Vegas, where big fight shows are far more frequent, but Chicagoans know what they like. For the most part, they liked the ferocity of featherweights Humberto Soto and Rocky Juarez in Saturday's action-filled bout that Soto won.

What some might call stick-and-move defensive strategy, the Chicago audience saw as slow and boring. And fans didn't hesitate to boo when they saw it, as early as the first round in some cases.

That fervor unfortunately spilled into disorderly conduct Saturday night. HBO, which sent its top boxing broadcast team of Jim Lampley, Larry Merchant and Emanuel Steward here, was less than pleased at a brawl in the stands that involved Vargas' entourage, required police intervention and marred the postfight wrap-up.

"Some coward hit one of my guys' wives in the face, and that started it," Vargas said.

We saw that boxing has a fan base here to build on if more big shows come to town. It's unclear exactly how many tickets actually were sold for the two fight cards, but the combined announced attendance was about 25,000.

We observed ethnic pride among Mexican-Americans and Polish-Americans, the most vocal contingents this time around.

Chants of "Mexico! Mexico!" rained down from Saturday's crowd in Rosemont, cheering Mexican fighter Soto's upset of previously unbeaten Juarez, a U.S. Olympic silver medalist. More surprising was how loudly they booed the introduction of Juarez, whose heritage includes a grandfather who boxed in Mexico.

Even though an injury in training forced Polish-born Chicago heavyweight Andrew Golota to withdraw from his scheduled Aug. 13 showdown against Polish rival Przemyslaw Saleta, a Polish-American group came to see Saleta's bout, a knockout loss to Oliver McCall. Walk-up sales likely were hurt when Golota vs. Saleta fell through.

Those who saw last week's fighters at one prefight appearance or another might have waited more than a half-hour for Vargas to make it to a news conference in a Mexican restaurant or seen him show up on time while the scale arrived a few minutes late for the weigh-in.

That was at North Avenue Beach, where the nudity followed. When Castillejo stripped to his undershorts and tipped the scales at 155 pounds, one over the 154-pound junior middleweight limit, he apparently felt his underwear weighed a pound.

He shed them and stepped back on the scale. While members of his team held up a sign to block the view, a few bystanders saw more.

"Oh, my word!" said a shocked woman, covering the eyes of the young girl beside her.

Castillejo, still one pound overweight, had to walk it off, then return to the scale to make weight.

Of all the things we learned from two weeks in boxing's spotlight, arguably the most cogent is this: Take boxers' prefight boasts with a pile of salt.

Here are some reminders: Mayorga predicted he would knock out Piccirillo in somewhere between 14 seconds and two rounds. Not to be outdone, Rahman said he might beat that time.

Before his fight, Vargas and his camp said he had gotten so strong it was "unfair to the others" for him to fight at 154. And Vargas, who said his new fitness regimen enabled him to eat what he loves and stay in shape, claimed after the bout, "I felt sluggish from the first round, probably because of all the weight I had to lose. I won't let myself get over 175 pounds between fights again."

If he and other fighters left here thinking Chicago's fans booed excessively, maybe there's something the boxers could learn from that: Remember what you boasted before you stepped into the ring.